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Artist of the Week: Kate Boy

In October 2011, Australian Kate Akhurst shared a casual drink with three Swedish electro musicians at their local pub in Stockholm that quickly led into an impromptu recording session at a studio around the corner. “I think we may have had just one drink,” Akhurst remembers, “and that was the night we wrote ‘Northern Lights.’ It only took about two hours in total.” For Kate Boy (a variation on band members Oskar Sikom Engström, Markus Dextegen, and **Hampus Nordgren Hemlin’**s former DJ moniker, Rocket Boy), writing the song that would become their debut single turned out to be the easy part. It was distance that proved to be more difficult. Akhurst, their vocalist, was commuting from London, and it took nearly a year for them to cohere as a group.

Now, of course, Akhurst is a full-time Stockholmer—“though my Swedish is still terrible”—and Kate Boy has produced an EP, three singles (including their latest, “The Way We Are,” below), and is in New York this week on their first North American tour, opening for HAIM at a Governors Ball after-party at Brooklyn Bowl on Saturday. Even without a debut album, which is expected next year, Kate Boy has shaped a sound that is distinct—electro-pop heavily influenced by the Knife with a penchant for the contrast of piercing high notes and booming drums.

Over breakfast at the Smile, it’s apparent that the chemistry that hastily brought this foursome together at a bar is none diminished by time gone by. “We all multitask on every track,” Engström says, “except for Hampus, who always plays bass.” “And we will play on anything,” Dexteger adds. “We even once considered bringing a big tube onstage,” Akhurst continues, finishing his sentence. “But we thought it would look too much like the Blue Man Group.”

The members of Kate Boy are of one mind when it comes to not only their music, but also to their visuals. Akhurst looks striking today with her dark hair tied tight in a bun and wearing a sheer black H&M jacket under a black-and-white leather IRO vest. Engström, Dextegen, and Hemlin, all three blond and of identical build, are similarly dressed monochromatically. “Black is our foundation,” Akhurst says. Both in live performance and in their videos, the band wears dark baseball caps that cast shadows across their faces, perhaps in an effort to block viewers from seeing just how beautiful Akhurst is. “Black puts music in front and visuals in the background,” as Engström says. “We like androgyny, mystery,” Akhurst continues. That way, Kate Boy can have a beautiful frontwoman and, as Dextegen says, “people don’t expect anything.”